


The Other Thing

by ticknart



Category: Daria (Cartoon)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-09
Updated: 2017-06-09
Packaged: 2018-11-12 02:45:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11152593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ticknart/pseuds/ticknart
Summary: Remembering her best friend and her brother.





	The Other Thing

**Author's Note:**

> The challenge was: "Write a fic, as long as needed to get the idea through the readers head, where a character reflects about their life by telling a story about themselves to their friends, kids, grandkids, ect. First the identity of the storyteller cannot be revealed until the end. They could be referred to simply as he, she, mom, grandfather, you get the idea.Second, the story can ether be an event in canon or something else of your choice."
> 
> But I needed to tag the story and that ruins it.

The sun was warm on my shoulders as I pushed the trowel into the dark, moist dirt. As I turned the soil, I was glad I'd remembered my big straw hat; I didn't need another deep, painful sunburn on my neck. It was early enough in the year that a part of me wanted to lose the hat, though. The shade it created on my face felt chilly, especially when there was a breeze.

Still, despite the chill in the air and the sun on my back, I felt good being out in the garden again. With every breath, I smelled the deep aroma of the earth around me. When I used a claw to break up the harder chunks, the smell became stronger, muskier. Nothing smelled like gardening directly in the soil. The smell in my greenhouse seemed wrong, artificial somehow. Maybe because it was too easy. Getting on my knees and working with the earth smelled like life. These sunny, dry, early spring days were one of the two things I most lived for.

"Aunttany?" came a little voice behind me.

"Yes?" I replied, not looking up from my work.

"What 'cha doin'?" 

A shadow passed over me as he came up next to me. I shivered as the cold moved up my back.

"I'm digging in the dirt," I said.

He let out a little grunt as he squatted next to me and asked, "Why?"

"To get it ready for the garden."

"Oh," he said.

He watched me dig and turn and claw in silence for several minutes. Something was on his mind. I was sure of it and was curious what he was thinking about. The mind of a four-year old was an amazing thing, but I didn't want to pry. Didn't want to push. When I did he'd just lock into himself, shut me out, and refuse to open up. The hardest and most important lesson I'd learned from him had been patience.

I turned to him and said, "Don't just sit there, Jorge, help your dear old Aunttany out."

His smile was full of an impossible number of teeth, "Really?"

"'Course. Did you think I'd want to do all this myself? Get your gloves and another trowel from the bucket."

"Can I get a claw, too?" He raised his clawed hands at me and growled.

"You gonna be careful?" I asked.

"'Course I am."

"Fine, then, but no running with it."

Jorge stood and hurried to the equipment bucket and started to root through it. He wasn't like other kids. He didn't just tip the bucket over or casually drop what he pulled out but didn't need; he pulled everything out, one at a time, made a pile for what he needed and one for everything else and then put it back with a deliberateness and focus most adults would never have. He amazed me every time I watched him.

I turned back to my work, back to my groove. Claw to loosen. Trowel to turn. Claw to break clods. Toss the rocks aside. Trowel to mix the former clods back in. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat until hungry or knees get sore or the wind gets too strong or the sun goes down.

He knelt beside me, sounding a little out of breath.

"You okay?" I asked.

"Yeah," he said, shoving his little hands into his gloves, "that bucket's heavy."

"Why did you lift the bucket?"

"I had to move it to by the door."

"Why did you move it? You weren't asked to move the bucket."

"I didn't want the grass to get hurt. It needs the sun to live." His dark eyes got big. "Doesn't it?"

I sighed, "Yes, it does." I sighed again. "Come on, grab that trowel and get started."

He did. We quickly fell into my usual pattern, with one exception: Jorge wouldn't let me throw the rocks away. He wanted them in a pile. "Together," he said. "Like a family."

After a while Jorge started to slow. He didn't stop digging or breaking dirt clods, but he didn't use the claw or trowel with any real force. He didn't seem tired, just listless.

He stopped working and sat up on his heels.

"Aunttany..." he said.

"Yeah."

"Why aren't you my mommy?"

I froze. This had been a question I knew would come, but like every inevitable question it came earlier than I hoped. It could have been so easy to avoid, too. From the very beginning I could have just told Jorge that I was his mother. I'd adopted him. I'd fed him. I'd clothed him. I loved him.

I couldn't outright lie to him, though, not about the big things, the important things. And telling him that he was my son would have been a lie. Except for Santa Claus, I'd been very careful not to lie to Jorge about anything. I'd loved his mother too much to do that.

God, he looked so much like her. They had the same big, dark eyes, untamable black hair, and olive skin. The shape of his face, though, and his nose belonged to his father. Fortunately, so far, that's all of my brother I'd seen in him.

I straightened my back and said, "You know I love you, Jorge, right?"

"'Course."

"And you know I'm like a mom, right?"

"Yeah. You 'dopted me."

"And that means...?"

"It means you picked me to be your son," he said. He paused, "How can I be your son, but you're not my mommy?"

I took a deep breath and said, "Because I don't ever want you to forget who your mother was."

"Iggy," he said. "The lady in that picture book."

After I left college, I moved out to California thinking that I'd be able to get into acting and become a big star. Then I'd show all those people who I was and they would be jealous of my fame and fortune.

It didn't quite work out the way I hoped, though. I made it into movies, just not the kind of movies that most people admit to each other they watch, even though they all are.

I tried. I tried really hard to get into real movies. I took classes to learn to act and get better control over my voice. I started to read more on my own because I used it to practice saying different lines. I tried to get an agent. And I went to every open casting call to get any kind of work that would eventually get me into the union.

That was where I met Iggy. Through a sea of white girls at a call asking for a twenty-something girl was one with dark skin. She sat next to me as the room cleared and we talked about living in LA and how hard it was to find work. She asked me what I did to make money and when I told her I was a waitress she got this half smile look on her face, because of course I was a waitress, wasn't that what all the hopeful starlets were? I laughed, she laughed, and I knew she could be my friend.

After I failed at the audition, she invited me up to her place, if I had nothing to do, which I didn't. She lived in a cute little 2-bedroom house up in Thousand Oaks. When we got there, I asked her about her roommates. She didn't have any roommates. I asked her how much her rent was. She didn't pay rent. I asked her how she could afford to own a house; she wasn't that much older than me, if she was having a tough time getting work, too.

She smiled her half smile and said she had a pretty regular gig.

When I asked her to tell about it, she brushed the question off, and I let it go, we'd just met. After hanging out for a month and running into each other at a couple auditions, I asked again. When she tried to brush it off I kept asking. I needed to know.

After she told me, I was shocked. I wondered how she could do something like that to herself. It was supposed to be private, something done with someone you care about, not in front a crew with crazy hot lights beating down on you. What did her family think of her?

She saw all of this on my face, I've never been particularly good at hiding my emotions, and said I could leave, she understood. I didn't, though. I sat and thought about it.

I mean, it's not like I only did it when I was in love with someone. Sometimes I just needed a release and sometimes that release just needed another person. And there was that one time at that party when I got a little tipsy and things got a little crazy and I gave a little show and reached out to help give a guy a happy ending. I looked at her house around me, her house.

Instead of leaving, I started to ask her about the work: How did the men on set act? Did she ever actually enjoy it? Was there any real acting? How often was it painful? What about disease? Is it okay to say no to doing some things? How much did she get paid? How long would it take for someone starting to get paid like that?

She answered all my questions and we moved on to regular thing.

A week later, my roommates booted me from our apartment and I moved in with Iggy. She hardly charged me anything.

When gas started to eat into too much of my budget and I couldn't find anything above fast food in Thousand Oaks, I asked her to make a call for me. She did. Two days later I went into an audition I didn't have to prepare for.

"Yeah," I said, a lump in my throat, "Iggy."

He thought for a minute and asked, "Why isn't she my mommy anymore?"

I sat down on my butt, crossed my legs, and pulled him into my lap. "She is your mommy," I said. "Don't ever think different."

"Then where is she?"

"She's, well, she isn't alive anymore."

"Why isn't she alive?"

We lived together for three years, me and Iggy.

During our second year in the house, my brother came to visit. He'd been so much better since he'd started taking his meds. So calm and generous. He was a different person. The kind of person I liked being around. The kind of person Iggy wanted to be with.

They fell in love.

He moved in with us. Lived with us. But he lived for Iggy.

There were times he forgot to take his meds. He felt so good about himself when he was with her that there were moments he thought he could be with her and off the medication and still be like everyone else. He couldn't though. I'd notice the signs of the frightening person he was -- the unfocused eyes, the flares of anger, the subtle threats -- and forced him to take the pills again by asking if he wanted to hurt Iggy. He'd get better again and be the man I'd always hoped he'd be.

Not long after they started sleeping together, Iggy got pregnant. Since my brother was the only man she let finish inside her, we all knew it was his and all three of us were thrilled.

My brother went nuts and bought all sorts of baby things he had to assemble. The floor of the living room was constantly covered with instruction and bits of wood and screws and tools.

Iggy stopped performing and started working behind the camera. She started by doing some writing then moved up to direct a scene for a compilation. After four or five scenes, she directed a full movie, with a belly so large she couldn't get behind a camera to actually look through it and had to depend solely on the monitors. As she went into labor she had just started to shoot another. She was brilliant.

Then, sooner than any of us expected, but right on time, Jorge was born. Dark hair on his head and dark skin and lungs that could cause tornadoes. It was a tiring, but good time.

As much as I loved living with Iggy and my brother and Jorge, the closer they got, the more uncomfortable I felt living there. I'd saved as much money as I could and thought I'd buy my own house. I had a nice down payment and work was steady, so I'd never have to worry about a mortgage, but I didn't want my house to be near Los Angeles. I figured I could own a place up north and then rent a room to stay in while I worked.

I made plans to stay in San Luis Obispo for two weeks. I'd vacation and while I was there hunt for houses around town and out at Morro Bay and Grover Beach.

On my eighth day, I got a weird text from Iggy. A jumble of letters. I thought maybe she sat on her phone or something.

The next day there was a hang-up from her waiting in my voice mail.

The day after that, she finally got through to me. She was crying and saying something about being afraid of my brother. Being afraid he'd hurt Jorge.

Without thought, I got in my car and sped down 99 to reach them.

I got to the house. Everything was quiet on the street. I got out of my car and up to the door and could hear Jorge crying. I burst though and rushed to Iggy's bedroom.

The bedroom was in immaculate condition, except for the absolute horror. I saw everything, but in the moment all I knew was I had to get Jorge and get him out of there. No time to react.

I started to sob. I pulled myself together enough to tell the person on the other end what I needed and where. She asked me if I wanted to stay on the line. I said no, hung up, and vomited on the hood of my car.

What I saw in the bedroom became clear in my mind. My brother had gotten a gun from somewhere. He came home. He found Iggy in the bedroom, probably just after putting Jorge down, and shot her. He then shot himself. If someone as dumb as me could figure that out, there'd be no need for a detective.

After I wiped my mouth off, I held Jorge close to me. I don't think I let him go for the next three days.

I sighed, "Because you daddy, as much as he loved you and Iggy, was sick. Not normal, barfy sick, but sick in his head. If he forgot to take his medicine for too long, he'd get really angry."

"Like when I broke the window?"

"Not like that. He'd get angry and he'd hurt people."

He looked at me, not understanding.

"He hurt your mom. He hurt her real bad and then he hurt himself."

"Oh," he said, looking away from me.

"Even though she's not around, she's still your mom. I want you to remember that she loved you more than anything else."

"Uh huh," he said, nodding.

"And even though I'm just your aunt," I hugged him as tight as I could, "I love you and am going to love you as much as any mommy out there."

"Okay," he said in a know-it-all way, pushing himself off my lap and standing.

"Good," I said. "How's tuna sound for lunch?"

"Look," he said, pointing down the block, "the mail man!"

"Why don't you go to the box and meet him and get the mail. I'll clean up and then we can go get something to eat."

"'Kay," he said, running to the sidewalk.

I picked up the tools, carried them over to the bucket, and dropped them in. I pulled off my gloves and shook them off before dropping them in, too. Jorge still had his glove on. The mail was going to be filthy.

"You know," he said as he walked toward me, "we both have the same last name."

"I know," I said, "it was your father's last name, too."

He looked down at the envelope and slowly read, "Bri-tan-ee tay-lor. Brittany Taylor." He looked up at me and smiled, "You have a good name, Aunttany."

"You do, too, Jorge."

**Author's Note:**

> Written in 2010 and posted at thepaperpusher.net.


End file.
